Charles Fain Lehman, fellow at the Manhattan Institute and senior editor of City Journal, believes Mangione’s crime is the very reason the death penalty exists: to draw a hard moral line against political violence in a democratic society. Nick Gillespie, editor at large at Reason magazine and host of The Reason Interview with Nick Gillespie, disagrees. He says the government has no business taking a life—no matter what.
First up, Charles Fain Lehman:
With Luigi Mangione, the moral facts are clear. A political murder, meant to reshape our society through violence, can never be tolerated in a democracy. Capital punishment is the proportional response.
While Mangione has not yet been convicted, the standard procedural objections to execution do not seem to apply. First, there is little doubt of his factual guilt—clear evidence links him to the murder, including a manifesto that was on his person at the time of his arrest. So concerns about executing an innocent man are not relevant. And while critics of the death penalty routinely claim it is disproportionately used against black and poor defendants, Mangione is white and privileged. Charges of bias do not hold water.
Continue reading the entire piece here at The Free Press (paywall)
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Charles Fain Lehman is a fellow at the Manhattan Institute and a contributing editor of City Journal. Nick Gillespie is an editor at large at Reason magazine and host of The Reason Interview with Nick Gillespie, disagrees.
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